Full Steam Ahead

Well, the plans are coming along. Oh, gosh...I feel like I am in overdrive and am just being pulled along! It might be better that way, lol.

I still have a few more major things to do, but overall, it is coming together. I cannot believe the way God is helping us to save money. And I think it will still be a beautiful day!

DJ/Music - A wonderful person from our church (who I've never met) has DJ equipment and is willing to let us rent it. He will come set it up and break it down - for only $250. My nephew Mike is going to be the MC and we are just going to hook up his Ipod (oh, excuse me - his Zune) with our own playlist. He is a great personality, so I think that will be great.

Invites - OK, one of my sweetest deals. I have been stressing over DIY and getting them done. They would end up either expensive, not that nice, or very time consuming - quite possibility a combination of any of the three. Someone mentioned etsy.com on liweddings.com and I checked out the site for homemade items. Well, a woman was discontinuing one of her styles and had 100 left. She was selling the invite/envelope/response card/envelope for $.80. Unheard of! And she does all the printing and assembling. The color is sage green, which I was thinking about. That made my decision fast! Sold!

Flowers - I am in the process of negotiating that one. I don't need a lot. I got a great quote from Liz, a great woman in Sayville. I am still shopping around to compare, but I think it is a sweet deal.

Make-up/hair - I went to one trial with Jacqueline Nicole. She is a sweetheart and we had such a good time talking. I left there beautifully made-up, but not sure if that was how I wanted to look on my wedding. I was a little stressed, because the trials are so expensive! I couldn't really afford to keep getting trials done! Through a course of conversation, I found out that my former student Shae is really great at make-up. I went to her house, she did a trial - and it was great! And she wants to do it for me as her gift to me. Sold! Her sister Keira is really good at hair, so we may be trying that as well.

By the way, her mom Eileen is a wedding pro and is giving me all kinds of help, too - candles for centerpieces, connections at a hotel, connections w/ flowers, limos, etc.... My good friend Kari is also an event planner, so we are planning to have a conversation about all this, too! Yay!

We are in the process of planning the rehearsal...I'm tempted to say dinner, but it's not a dinner. We are thinking of doing it the Saturday morning the weekend before the wedding. If it all works out, we'll rehearse, then go back to my parents for bagels, muffins, fruit - a brunch type of thing. Much simpler, much cheaper. I think I would be stressed if I had to do this the week of the wedding.

I also got my time off from school approved! Thank you Jesus!

So, what I still have left to do...centerpieces, decide on hair, limos, flowers, ...I still need the veil, shoes, jewelry... it's a lot, but most of the big ones are out of the way.

The big news, though? The place we will be living...more to come on that later...